Rosebuds
by Starlightlovesya123
Summary: Death can leave such a stain on one's mind. It can open up the door to something terrible, something that eats at the soul and changes reality. Riza sits on the floor of the cellar, only wishing she could make sense of what's real.


_**Author's Note:**__ So, let's get one thing straight. I've watched perhaps two FMA episodes in my entire life. Everything I've learned about the characters and setting has been from my dear friend, shattered petal, who's been obsessed with the series for quite a while now. Me, on the other hand? I'm a Batman nerd. But, because it's my dear friend's birthday, I decided I would write her this tiny little one-shot just to make her happy. Regardless of whether it's ridiculous or OOC, I hope anyone who reads (but especially you, La) enjoys it._

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><p>A soft, dull snap, and the fire ignites.<p>

She grits her teeth, throwing her arms around her bundled frame. The shivers are subsiding a bit, but not much.

Her eyes close immediately—she knows he's here and she doesn't want to look at him. She's too upset, her emotions too unstable. She'll start crying or something ridiculous like that.

"That was beyond foolish," he says quietly. His deep, almost monotone voice reverberates around the walls of the stone cellar. From the sound of it, he's about 10 feet behind her, and has stopped walking.

She ignores him, but inches slightly closer to the fire.

"I mean it. You could have been killed out there."

"Gee. That's a first," she mutters under her breath, clenching and unclenching her fists to warm them. Or maybe to help her cope. She doesn't know.

His boots start to clip across the floor again, and in a moment the edge of his steel-toe is in her line of vision. "Riza," is all he says.

"Colonel Mustang," is how she replies. Except she says it bitterly, like a curse, while he says her name all soft and gentle.

A pause. Then he speaks again, but his voice is louder, more commanding.

"Riza. Olivier's death is not your fault."

There it is. That name again.

_(What name? Who? Hush, now, hush…)_

She squeezes her eyes shut and bunches her toes and bites the edge of her lip. Blood splashes the insides of her memories, coating them like paint, making everything run red. And those cries…

_(It never happened, Riza. No cries, only desperate, bad dreams. Miles is at home in the kitchen and Olivier-)_

"I would like for you to go, Colonel," she speaks up, her voice too sharp, nearly breaking towards the end. "I would like you to leave."

"I'm afraid I have a higher command status than you, Hawkeye. As it is, I can do as I wish." The words are harsh, strong and powerful, but he says them with the sorrow of a young child, one who's just seen their home of seven years be burned to the ground.

"I'm _asking _you to leave." The way Riza's words sound like a plea makes her hate herself. Even more than she already does.

"And I am denying that request. Oliv—"

_(Who, huh, what? Shh. There's no such thing.)_

"Stop," Riza chokes, her eyes opening. Tears are already blurring her vision.

He continues speaking anyway. His feet haven't moved, but have planted themselves firmly in the small puddle next to her. "Looking for revenge, by yourself, with nothing more than a rifle and a pocket knife isn't going to get you anything, Riza. Getting yourself killed isn't going to bring her back."

_(Her? Who's her? I've never heard of anyone-)_

Riza brings her hands closer to her face and they're shaking violently. It's like something is inside of them, slicing open the veins, rushing the blood to the surface. Tiny little rosebuds, just like the ones covering Olivier's grave.

"It didn't happen," she whispers to herself. "There's no way something as simple as a rifle could hurt Oli—"

There's suddenly something warm and pleasant covering her palms. It squeezes the skin of her fingers, and the blood fades, slowly falling back to where it should be. The rosebuds settle and fall, bloom and grow, fade away with time and age.

"Riza?" It's Roy's voice. Much closer now. Only a few inches away. "You remember Lust, don't you?"

A tear drops down her cheek and settles into her hair, which is already damp from melted snowflakes. "Yes," she mumbles, barely opening her lips.

"A homunculus. You remember."

She doesn't reply. Doesn't want to.

_(Homunculus? What homunculus? Don't listen to him, Riza. Olivier's standing in the field right now, gun at her hip, lips pressed in focus. You remember. You know.)_

The pressure around her fingertips increases, and she can feel Roy's breath against her nose and the edge of her cheeks. She doesn't dare look into his eyes, but keeps her gaze firmly on the stone ground.

"Listen to me, General Hawkeye. Olivier is gone. But that is not your fault."

_(Lies! Olivier is here, you know she is, Riza. No hand could match her, no one could spill her blood. She was like a goddess, you remember, a war demon-)_

"Demon," Riza repeats and she shudders, closing her eyes again and struggling not to sob.

"Yes, a demon," Roy replies, as if she's been talking to him this entire time. "You've let a homunculus inside you again, Riza, and it's going to tear you apart."

"Already has," she whispers, and looks at her hands again. The blood suddenly splatters the surface of her pale white skin again, dances across her fingernails. Like the rosebuds. Pretty rosebuds that hold so much death.

Olivier's blood, covering Riza's calluses. Olivier, lying in an open field with an open wound and open eyes and closed doors. Riza, unable to do anything, arriving too late, lying next to her dear friend and watching the breath escape her lips.

"It's Denial, Riza," Roy says softly, and rubs his hands around hers. "Denial is a homunculus. He's making you see things, making you hear things. He's settled himself in your mind. I came here because the others were worried—"

_(Worried? There's no reason for them to be worried. You're fine, Riza, aren't you?)_

"No. I'm not." The words come out in a sigh, and the blood that Riza sees on her hands disappears. Her eyes slowly move up to meet Roy's.

He looks just as tired as she does. His crop of black hair is in desperate need of a cut, and his bangs hang over his forehead and into his eyes. His skin is as pale as ever, cheeks sallow, lips in a tight line. Yet he's still handsome. Always has been.

She doesn't know what to do, so she drops the gun that she's been hiding in her lap, lets it fall with a clatter onto the cold stone floor. The clip is empty, but she empties her pockets of her bullet casings, and they drop to the ground with all the clarity and familiarity that she's used to. One after another, ruthless little death machines, parasites no larger than a penny. Each one creates a feverish ring as its metal hits the rock.

Then she slants forward, as if she's about to faint, and lets Colonel Mustang catch her. And before she knows it, she's blubbering out gibberish, sobbing, her words a jumbled confusion caused by Denial. Part of her story is true—she heard an emergency call from Miles, rushed to the battlefield, found Olivier with a gaping hole in her side. Part of the story is a mess made by Denial—that she wrapped up the wound and cleaned it, that Olivier was never wounded to begin with, that there was no blood on the ground but simply mashed berries or red paint. Ridiculousness.

She begs forgiveness over and over, so many times that she's worried asking isn't enough, that there's some sort of Alchemy she needs, Alchemy her father never taught her.

Alchemy that he might have taught Roy.

Roy, who after five minutes of this, hasn't said a word. Roy, who stares back at her with emotions she can't place, because she's never been able to read him. He's so complex, so ridiculous, so much everything that she wants and desires that she can't begin to sort it out in her head, let alone speak it aloud. Roy, who she's always been trying to rescue, but who always ends up being the one to rescue her.

She can't stop crying. She can't stop talking. She can't freeze her tongue, can't quit her language.

So, after a moment, he suddenly does it for her. He stops her words with a kiss, covering her aching lips with his own, and for a few moments the world is blissfully silent. Denial shuts up, Riza shuts up, the wind stops whistling and the rosebuds stop following their endless trail across her fingers.

He leans back. He stands up. Without a word, he exits.

She's left sitting there, her knees in the puddle where his feet once were, the water seeping into the fabric of her trousers. Her eyes are wide and still producing tears, which fall like raindrops and hit the puddle soundlessly.

_(That didn't just happen.)_

But it did.


End file.
